Elastic or rubber thread or yarn and method of manufacturing the same



Oct. 4-, 1938 T L, SHEPHERb 2,131,981

ELASTIC OR RUBBER THREAD OR YARN AND METHOD OF MANUFACTURING THE SAME Filed March 18, 1955 7.2:. ghe h rj ELASTIC R, RUBBER THREAD 0R YARN- gND METHOD OF MANUFACTURHNG THE Thomas Lewis Shepherd, London, England Application March 18, 1935, Serial No. 11,720

InGreat Britain March 221, 1934i 6 Claims. (CL 117-2) This invention relates to elastic or rubber whereby a ubber thread may be coated as will I threads or yarns which are intended to be subse hereafter be described;

quently used in the manufacture of fabric, Figure 2 is avi t t th d being clothing, lacework and the like or parts thereof twisted together; I. or for wearing apparel of any description. Figure 3 is a diagrammatic view of apparatus 5 Such a yarn is usually made by first forming for extruding ,athread. a core of a rubber filament or thread which has Th'erubber thread is to be coated with combeen either extruded into a coagulating or spinminuted material and a suitable adhesive ,is prening bath, or has been cut from a sheet of rubpared, so that the comminuted material is held ber, and such filament is then covered with a in suspension. The thread bto be covered is now 10 double helical winding of cotton, silk and the drawn or otherwise passed under rollers eand like of relatively opposite twist so as to form through the mixture (1 in a bath 0 in the man.- as it were a fibrous jacket or covering to the her shown inFigure 1 'sothat it will pick up a rubber core. This fibrous covering will constlcoating of the mixture, i. e. the solution and the tute a protection tothe core when the threads comminuted material. When the thus .coat'ed vl5 or yarns are laidacross one another as will rethread leavesthe receptacle, it is subjected to a sult when the yarn is being woven or knitted squeezingor pressing action by the rollers ffto into a fabric, so that the intercrossing cores will. consolidate the coating and bring it into .intinot cut into one another. -mate contact with the thread.- The coated Such. a fabric covering is not altogether sucthread is then led away for drying, after which 20 cessful in practice, because the twisted convoa vulcanizing or a hardening treatment may be lutions of the fibrous covering may and do exert employed,

an undesired influence on the degree of stretch such a systemof coating thread may be ext e ven t e e s c y rn. nd int f e tended to the manufacture of compound threads with its contractibility back to normal size. The o yarn according to which and referring to Fig- 25 plication of the fibrous covering is expensive ure 5, two (or more) threads of rubber m in an and requires to be very carefully executed, and unvulca'ni d or tacky condition are brought again h fi r v r ng possesses a ten n together and twisted or doubled one upon the to creep move relatively to the core. other. These threads which have already been Moreover, when rubber threads are to be led coated as shown at n with the finely divided or 30 into a loom or knitting machine so as to be comminuted material or have had such material formed into a fabric, it is very often difficult incorporated therein and under tension or not to control the rubber threads because of the are then twisted together as shown at o by any extensive and variable stretch that they possess suitable means (not shown) and while this twist,

and the result of this capacity of the thread ing proceeds the finely divided material already 35 results in the fabric when completed having a present on each thread becomes firmly amalganon-uniform surface appearance or causes shir mated and mixed with the doubled thread 0 ring and other defects in the finished material. which can now be described-as yarn, and it The object of the invention hereinafter dewill be understood'that an additional quantity 40 scribed is to overcome this last mentioned defect of the coating mixture as indicated at 10 may be 40 and also to prevent the threads cutting into one added as the manufacture of the compound another when they are laid across one another thread proceeds.

or across textile threads as is the case when The rubber thread to be used according to any they are woven into a fabric. of the above arrangements may be produced in Other objects and advantages will appear from various ways, for instance it maybe formed by 45 the following description. v extruding or otherwise or it may be a thread al- I find that by using comminuted material acready vulcanized. V cording to the invention, a thread maybe pro- Additional comminuted material may also be duced which is resistant to cross-cutting, does mixed in suspension in the bath containing the not possess a frictional surface, possesses reduced rubber solution and the mixture extruded 50 extensibility, and may be dyed. through nozzles as usual into a coagulating The invention will now be described by way bath, which system will be hereafter referred to of example with reference to the accompanying in connection with Figure 3, the resulting rubdrawing in which I ber thread being then coated as described above. Figure 1 is a diagrammatic view of a device The adhesive when used may be any kind 55 which is suitable and may comprise rubber, Celluloid, cellulose, a suitable varnish, a resin, synthetic or natural, glue, linseed oil and the like.

Further, it may have a consistency which sets or is stabilized by means of heat, chemical action or otherwise so that it may be left in any desired final condition, that is to say it will be flexible or tough or hard. Moreover, the adhesive maybe vulcanizable similarly to rubber and the term rubber used herein should be understood as including rubber in any suitable form, namely any of those compounds as used for proofing cloth and the like material, any aqueous dispersion thereof, latex or a natural or artificial compound of rubber and in a concentrated or compounded form.

It is to be noted that substances may be used according to the invention that are usually treated as waste. Moreover the subdivided material may be dyed or capable of absorbing a dye so as to impart to the finishedproductamulti-coloured r speckled appearance and in some cases the coated filament after vulcanization or hardening may be so treated with a solvent that small portions of the outer skin of the coating will be removed or dissolved so as to expose to view the finely subdivided material and thus give thethread a speckled appearance.

Referring to Figure 3, q shows a bath containing a mixture of an aqueous dispersion of latex, for example, suspended in which is a desired quantity of' finely divided comminuted flock-like or similar material indicated at r. From the bath q the solution is pumped at s into a duct t leading to any usual form of extruding nozzle u,' the duct and the nozzle'being submerged in a tank 1) containing any suitable liquid coagulant such as w. The compound-thread which is extruded by the nozzle u. will thus be the threads are the threads are coagulated in passing through the coagulating liquid w, the thread being subsequently led away under a suitable tension if desired over a roller :1: for subsequent treatment including the coating as described above.

I claim: f

1. A compound thread formed of elastic rubber and coatedwith a protective material to hold the thread rigid, such protective material being lacking at predetermined local areas to forma speckled thread. a v

2. A compound rubber thread consisting of rubber threads twisted together and holding additional comminuted material in the interstices, each rubber thread being provided with a coating throughout which comminuted material is suspended.

3'. A process for coating rubber thread with acoating throughout which comminuted material is suspended which consists in passing it through a bath of liquid coating throughout which comminuted material is suspended, consolidating the coating on the thread by rollers, and drying the liquid on the thread.

4.- A process for forming a compound rubber thread, which consists in coating rubber threads as specified in claim 3, with the addition that twisted together before drying.

5. A process for forming a compound rubber thread, which consists in coating rubber threads as specified in claim 3, with the addition that twisted together before drying, and that comminuted material is added during the twisting.

6. A process as moving the outer parts.

skin of the coating at least in THOMAS LEWIS SHEPHERD.

claimed in claim 3, and re- 

